Rashmi Rajya Laxmi Shah, daughter of renowned poet and artist Balkrishna Sama, was a full collaborator along with her husband Jagat Prakash Jung Shah to the anti-Rana democratic movement led by the Nepali Congress. After Jagat Shah was killed in action during a revolt against King Mahendra’s government in 1962, Rashmi Rajya stayed in Calcutta as refugee. Son Naveen Prakash Jung Shah recalls that it was only after the death of her husband that she fully adopted the red insignias of a married woman. The poem above was written sometime before she committed suicide a day before Teej of the same year.

Calcutta, 1962. Original calligraphy of her composition by Rashmi Rajya Laxmi Shah.